XiJaro & Pitch

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XiJaro & Pitch are the trance music producer/DJ duo of Xander van Dommelen and Anthony Reyers.

Formed in 2014, they are best known as the musical minds behind dozens of spine-tingling, uplifting releases on some of the most prestigious labels in trance and also as the creators of the weekly show “Open Minds Live”, which is currently taking the Twitch trance community by storm.

Most notably their work has already seen them be hand-picked by Armin van Buuren for his famous “A State Of Trance” mix compilation as well as landing them the opportunity to play at the coveted Luminosity Beach Festival.

Anthony, born in Belgium on April 29th 1992, never let the fact he is blind stop him from chasing his dreams and living his passion for melodic dance music. Discovering trance at the age of 10, listening to the sounds of Tiësto and Armin van Buuren through the FM airwaves, he immediately knew his life would be changed forever. Not much later, in 2005, he started his own trance radio show as DJ Pitch.

Xander, born in Holland on August 28th 1985, felt the pull of the emotion and energy that makes trance music so unique through the same airwaves, with the radioshow A State Of Trance being a big early influence. Armin van Buuren’s Year Mixes inspired him to make his own mash-ups and megamixes, which would later lead to him producing his own music. In 2005 he founded the XiJaro music project along with some friends and, like Anthony, he soon started to broadcast his own radio mixes to the world.

Anthony and Xander crossed paths during their radio efforts in 2007 and began discussing music and exchanging guest mixes. This quickly led to more collaborations; first on mixes and mash-ups, and eventually also on their own music productions. Feeling their skills really complemented each other, they decided to officially join forces as “XiJaro & Pitch” in 2014 and set out to take their adventure in music to the next level.

And that they did. They started with the launch of “Open Minds”, a new monthly trance radio show on Afterhours.FM, and they began visiting each other in the studio to work on their first original productions as a duo. In 2015 they released the first fruit of their labour, a track called “We Are Alive”, on Defcon Recordings.

Since then many more releases have followed, finding their way onto labels like Who’s Afraid Of 138?!, FSOE, Subculture, Nocturnal Knights, AVA White and Uplift Recordings.

Some of the highlights include “Whispers Of Time”, “Moving Souls”, “Lost In Memories”, “Falling Leaves”, “Amor Vincit Omnia”, “Sfeer” and “Nothing Set In Stone”. All of which have garnered them big support from DJs such as Armin van Buuren, Aly & Fila, John O’Callaghan, Ferry Tayle, Talla 2XLC, RAM, Sean Tyas, Darren Porter and Steve Allen.

Xander and Anthony played their first DJ gig together in 2015 at IN PRIVATE: The 3rd Chapter, an intimate event hosted by Trance Family Belgium, for which they also wrote and produced the anthem. This was later succeeded by several performances at events from Luminosity, SYNERGY Events and Have Faith In Trance.

Meanwhile their Twitch show Open Minds Live has gathered a dedicated following and community that is tuning in every week for Anthony’s eclectic selections of new dance music releases, ranging from deep house and melodic techno to uplifting & orchestral trance.

In July 2020 they organised the “Keep Our Worlds From Fading To Silence” fundraising event, featuring many big guest DJs and a whopping 12-hour marathon set from Anthony himself. They smashed the fundraising goal by over 200%, bringing in more than £30,000 worth of donations for the Norrie Disease Foundation, a charity very close to Anthony’s heart.

Having found a grand new audience in 2020 with their live streaming efforts the duo look forward to continuing to enthrall their many listeners across the world, while further honing their own craft in the studio to deliver even more exciting music in the near future.

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Dj